The Radio Boys in the Thousand Islands eBook

While Cub was thus occupied, Mr. Perry set a hasty
supper of prepared foods on the table and “ate
a bite”. Then he returned to the chart and
wheel house and relieved Hal, sending the latter back
to the cabin for his meal and for further radio consultation
with the other boys.

CHAPTER V

A Baffling Situation

The compass worked admirably. Although the principle
of the affair was very simple, Hal must be given credit
for having done his work well.

So satisfactory did the device prove from the moment
when it began to take messages from the “island
prisoner”, that all on board the Catwhisker
became hopeful of success before sun-down. “V
A X” kept a stream of waves leaping from his
aerial for their guidance and the motor boat chug-chugged
along like a hunting hound made more and more eager
by the increasing excitement of the hunt.

“I wonder what’s become of the fellow
who tried to head us off,” remarked Hal as he
left the supper table and prepared to relieve Cub at
the wireless. “You haven’t heard
anything from him, have you?”

“No, not a thing all day,” Cub replied.
“I guess we’ve tired him out. Did
you get anything from him, Bud?”

“Not a shiver of the wires,” answered
the latter.

“Maybe he’s given us up as hopeless easy
marks,” Cub suggested.

“Why, do you think his story is true and ‘Bobby
Crusoe’ is a fake?” asked Hal.

“I don’t know. I wouldn’t be
surprised to find almost anything—­or nothing—­as
we get near to the end of our hunt.”

“But he must be on the island,” Bud reasoned.
“And he must have a wireless set, or he couldn’t
have sent the messages we got. That much is certain.”

“Not all of it,” Hal objected.

“Why?” Bud demanded.

“Maybe he isn’t on an island.”

“You mean, maybe the whole thing’s a fake—­eh?”

“Maybe.”

“If the whole thing’s a fake, then that
other fellow who tried to head us off must ’ave
been a party to the game,” Cub interposed.

“There wouldn’t be much sense in that,”
said Bud.

“I agree with you,” Cub continued.
“The scrap between those two hams was genuine
enough.”

“But they were holding something back from us,”
Hal declared.

“Both of them?” asked Bud.

“I shouldn’t be surprised.”

“Nor I, either,” said Cub.

“Then they’ve put one over on us,”
was Bud’s inference. “Are you sorry
we came?”

“I? No, sir!” Cub emphasized.
“It’s a dandy adventure, whatever the
result. I didn’t swallow that Crusoe story
whole at any time.”

“Neither did I,” said Hal.

“I thought there were some funny things about
it,” Bud announced reflectively; “but
I didn’t know how to put them together or take
’em apart.”

“That was my fix,” said Cub; “and
it’s my fix yet.”

“I guess we all agree that the whole affair
is very strange,” Hal concluded. “We
really don’t believe we’ve been told the
truth, and yet we get in worse trouble when we try
to make something else out of it.”